Just the facts on asbestos

October 30, 2003

Dear Sir,

Please permit me to inject a little objectivity into the ongoing discussion on what to do with Bermuda's asbestos. In assessing the threat it helps to have a few facts on hand. Asbestos is a group name for about six different naturally occurring materials which share the characteristics of being fibrous, largely chemically and biologically inert and essentially fireproof.

The material finds a huge range of applications construction, electrical and automotive components and contrary to popular belief continues to be mined, refined and used in everyday products.

The health risk posed by asbestos is almost exclusively limited to asbestos miners and processors who have been exposed to high levels of airborne particles over a long period. Risks include mesothelioma, an extremely rare cancer, and asbestosis, a scarring of the tissues of the lungs causing reduced elasticity and hence difficulty breathing.

In both cases the damage is caused by the body's own reactions to a large volume of foreign, inert, fibrous material impinging on sensitive mucous membranes, not from any innate toxicity of asbestos. Dust from fibreglass, sawdust, coal and grain can all have similar effects but nobody is getting excited about them yet.

Clinical studies and empirical evidence show that inhaling, touching, eating or drinking small quantities of asbestos do not pose any health risks to otherwise healthy people. The real threat of asbestos is from lawyers and their ignorant or greedy (but otherwise healthy) clients engaging in class action law suits to cash in on the precedent set in the few valid cases against producers and processors of asbestos. It is the fear of litigation, not cancer that has made asbestos the monster that it is.

That fear wastes untold resources on hysterical overreaction to a risk that is vanishingly small when compared to the truly unpleasant chemicals that are casually released in our environment everyday like selenium, lead, pesticides, herbicides, solvents, antibiotics and recreational drugs.

Every objective review agrees that the best way to increase the threat of asbestos in the environment is to disturb it. Proactive removal of asbestos will only result in the exposure of more people to more airborne particles. Aggregation of the resulting waste increases the potential for accidental release from localised concentrations.

That said, you will still get a greater exposure to airborne asbestos from the ablative brake linings on every vehicle you share the road with than you will ever see from asbestos left in place or properly contained at the storage site. So what do we do with it, now that we have disturbed it, moved it, concentrated it and in doing so created a bigger public health concern than existed if we had left it alone?

We can't dissolve, re-process, decompose or burn it. We can't naively export it and trust that we won't be hit with a class-action suit. Fortunately the only credible risk of asbestos is posed by airborne particles, so the obvious solution is to submerge it in a deep, remote body of water, but where would we find such a thing? Out here? In the middle of the ocean? Hmmmm.

Load the containers on a barge, take them 13.5 miles offshore and push them into the abyss. It is the only logical, cost effective and consequence free solution. Anything else is an expensive, knee-jerk capitulation to hysteria.

JONATHAN DYER

Hamilton Parish

Stonington will be missed

October 25, 2003

Dear Sir,

How very, very sad. We have been following the news of Stonington's demise, and feel like there has been a death in the family. We have stayed at Stonington at least 15 times, after staying at places all over the Island, but would always return to Stonington. Why? Because of the devoted staff. Because of the wonderful views. Because of great food. Because we always felt "at home" there. No matter how much money is poured into the place, no matter how many "professionals" are brought in to "upgrade" the services, it can never be better than it was. Stonington Beach will be sorely missed.

MR. AND MRS. HAROLD SHAW

North Conway, New Hampshire